


I'll Be Good

by pagets



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: F/F, s7 au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-08
Updated: 2016-02-08
Packaged: 2018-05-19 03:41:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5952379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pagets/pseuds/pagets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Basically season 7 of Buffy from the car ride Willow and Faith take from L.A. to Sunnydale (Orpheus/Dirty Girls) but reworked to make Willow/Faith a romantic pairing because I've always thought that would have worked really well considering where they were both at in their personal arcs. Rating will probably go up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'll Be Good

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from the song I'll Be Good by Jaymes Young. I've thought of a million ways this conversation could go but finally writing it out I hope that I captured both of them in a realistic way. Also Willow/Kennedy aren't a thing, the killer in me plot still happened but without them getting together in the end.

After a few hours Faith had gotten a basic run down on the latest impending apocalypse and they weren’t too far from the town limits of Sunnydale. The two women had settled in to a surprisingly comfortable silence, letting the soft static of the car radio fill the atmosphere, but Faith was still somewhat tense. She recalled something Angel had said to her before she had left the Hyperion, that she’d been gone for a long time and she had to remember that as much as she had changed so had everyone else. _The world spins madly on_ and the Sunnydale she left, the people she remembered weren’t necessarily the same ones she left behind. It had settled the unease she had felt about the road trip she was now on with the redhead beside her but it was Willow’s complete failure to meet Faith’s expectations of hostility and judgement was making her so tense now.

 

Willow had filled her in on the main players, on the potential slayers, The First and everything pertinent to whatever was coming but she’d essentially avoided talking about anything personal or specific about the lives of the Scoobies. The only relevant personal information that had been revealed to her was that Joyce had passed away. _That fucking sucked._

 

“I don’t know if it’s some weird Wiccan-zen thing or whatever, Red but I gotta say you’re kinda the last person I expected to welcome me back with out so much as a word.” Faith wasn’t one not to be forthcoming with her thought and Willow was viably startled by the sudden starting of conversation. She glances over at Faith and who fumbles through her thoughts before turning her eyes back to focus on the road. “I mean even before the killing and the hostage taking and shit went to hell, we weren’t exactly Thelma and Louise, ya know?” The slayer looks over at Willow expectantly and notices as she begins to reply but stops herself. Gathering her thoughts for a minute longer. “I’m just saying if you’ve got anything to say, I can take it.”

 

“Faith, a lot has happened while you were away. A lot has changed…” Willow hesitates having never explained, to someone with no prior knowledge, what had happened last spring. Ultimately she tries for an approach that doesn’t really require her to, “I guess, let’s just say that out of everyone I’m probably the last person who should be pointing fingers and leave it at that, ‘kay?” 

 

Faith is thrown, shifts back into her seat and counters, “Sure Will, we can leave it at that but maybe you forgot I’m now a wanted fugitive. I killed people. I tried to kill B, and you and pretty much everyone so unless—“ Willow shoots her a sharp glance, looking away ashamed. “Oh.” 

 

“Yeah.”

 

“God, Willow, what happened?” Faith shocked herself with the genuine concern in her voice but she can’t imagine that Willow of all people has been down that path, is on the same path now that she is, that Angel is on. 

 

“It’s a long story, Faith. It’s hard to—“ Faith can see how difficult it is for her to speak about but before she get’s a chance to back off Willow continues, “I had, have really, a problem with magic. I was abusing it and I couldn’t stop,” Willow is shaking her head, “not even when my girlfriend left me.”

 

Faith interrupts, “That shy bird you were with at the Bronze when B and I went all Freaky Friday on each other?” Willow nods. 

 

“Yeah, Tara,” she smiles weakly. Just saying her name forms a lump in her throat, makes it harder for her to breathe. Faith however is preoccupied with her evidently impressive observational skills. 

 

“I knew it!” This causes Willow to look over at her, Faith immediately putting her hands up, body turned slightly toward the witch as a form of surrender. “Hey, I’m not judging. Trust me, I didn’t care much either way before the big house, whatever got the job done, ya know? But then when the only male option is some sleazy guard wanting to play out some fucked up fantasy it’s not even a question about what team I’m gonna walk up to the pitch for. It gets real lonely, real damn fast.”

 

Willow feels her cheeks flush at the scenario that Faith has just put forward but continues, “Anyway, I went too far and I pulled fucked up dumb shit and her leaving wasn’t even enough I just got worse and worse. I was lying to myself until one night I was so wrecked outta my mind that I crashed a car with Dawn inside and she got hurt.”

 

“Jesus, Buffy woulda freaking lost it.” Willow chuckles at Faith’s exclamation but it’s more like a self inflicted scolding and Faith listens has the rest of the story unfolds hardly able to believe what she’s hearing.

 

* * *

 

“So, murderer: check. Tried to kill Buffy and pretty much everyone else: check and to top it all off, tried to destroy the world single handedly. I think that puts me over the top, no offence. The Mayor was kinda the brains of the operation, plus you were in a coma when it all actually went down.” Faith’s eyebrows shoot up and the former wallflower’s bluntness and Willow offers a small apologetic smile. 

 

Taking this “new” Willow in stride Faith replies, “None taken, fair enough,” but waits a few moments before addressing the more intense parts of what Willow has just confessed. “You’re not a bad person, I mean that’s what Angel’s always telling me and hell I wasn’t even on anything I was just fucking everything up cause I didn’t know how to not and then it was just easier to be what everyone expected me to be rather than actually try and do better. But I’m doing that now, and it’s fucking hard as hell. Road to redemption my ass, it’s the freaking Swiss Alps.” Laugher bubbles from Willow’s lips and they both chuckle, letting some of the seriousness dissipate. 

 

“I don’t know about good or bad, I think the lines are a but more blurry these days or I don’t know, maybe there never were any and they just made it easier to deal with everything when we were in high school but we’re not in high school anymore. Everything is different, and I can’t speak for everyone but whatever’s coming, it’s big Faith and we need you. We can’t afford past hangups getting the way of things, the mission is what matters. We’re in the big leagues and I don’t know how many of us are gonna make it.” Willow’s voice is rich with worry and for the first time Faith acknowledges how futile the situation might actually be. She knows their drawing closer to now, she feels the pull of the Hellmouth. It’s fucked up but it’s almost like it’s calling out to her. It lights a fire in her veins and she’s ready for whatever is coming their way. And she can’t help but feel that an unexpected kinship has sparked between herself and Willow. 

 

Like she and Angel the mistakes and the fuck ups that got them here were so vastly different but the path they were on now was all the same. To atone, to be good again. If they ever were to begin with. But hearing Willow tell her about all that had happened made her sure of one thing, 

“I gotta be honest, Red. I gotta feeling I’ll see you on the other side.” 

**Author's Note:**

> All mistakes are my own. I haven't written anything in a while and I was just impatient to post it.


End file.
